Hi Group,
If you can use a laugh about now check out the Ig Noble awards.
Caution, do not have any liquids in your mouth when reading these as you may
spray your monitor screen.
Art
<A
HREF="http://64.4.16.250/cgi-bin/linkrd?_lang=EN&lah=55529dc7a294c7f2ab9ceb9e7c0\
81651&lat=1065300933&hm___action=http%3a%2f%2fwww%2eimprob%2ecom%2fig%2fig%2dpas\
twinners%2ehtml">http://www.improb.com/ig/ig-pastwinners.html</A>

My favorite Ig noble awards are:

LITERATURE
Vicki L. Silvers of the University of Nevada-Reno and <A
HREF="http://www.cmsu.edu/psychology/faculty/kreiner.html">David S. Kreiner</A>
of Central Missouri State University, for their colorful report "The Effects
of Pre-Existing Inappropriate Highlighting on Reading Comprehension." [
PUBLISHED IN: <A HREF="http://explorers.tsuniv.edu/cra/">Reading Research
and Instruction</A>, vol. 36, no. 3, 1997, pp.
217-23.]

ECONOMICS
The executives, corporate directors, and auditors of Enron, Lernaut &
Hauspie [Belgium], Adelphia, Bank of Commerce and Credit International
[Pakistan], Cendant, CMS Energy, Duke Energy, Dynegy, Gazprom [Russia],
Global Crossing, HIH Insurance [Australia], Informix, Kmart, Maxwell
Communications [UK], McKessonHBOC, Merrill Lynch, Merck, Peregrine
Systems,
Qwest Communications, Reliant Resources, Rent-Way, Rite Aid, Sunbeam,
Tyco, Waste Management, WorldCom, Xerox, and Arthur Andersen, for adapting
the mathematical concept of <A
HREF="http://www.math.toronto.edu/mathnet/answers/imaginary.html">imaginary
numbers</A> for use in the business
world. [NOTE: all companies are U.S.-based unless otherwise noted.]

PEACE
<A HREF="http://www1.omnitel.net/grutas/firml.htm">Viliumas
Malinauskus</A> of <A
HREF="http://www.travel-lithuania.com/_flashcontrols/welcome_new.htm">Grutas,
Lithuania</A>, for <A
HREF="http://www.balticsww.com/lenin_to_zappa.htm">creating</A> <A
HREF="http://www.time.com/time/europe/summerculture/html/snf/stalin.html">the
amusement
park</A> known as "<A HREF="http://www.balticsww.com/stalin_world.htm">Stalin
World</A>"

StalinWorld
CITY PAPER reports on an unlikely theme park provoking laughter—and
outrage—in Lithuania.

You may have thought Disneyland and Stalin-era mass deportations
had nothing in common. They do now—thanks to
enterprising Lithuanian Viliumas Malinauskas. The 60-year-old canned
mushroom mogul recently opened an odd-ball park that mimics a Soviet prison
camp.
The facility—part amusement park, part open air museum—is circled by barbed
wire and guard towers, and dotted with some 65 bronze and granite statues of
former Soviet leaders Vladimir Lenin and Josef Stalin, and assorted communist
VIPs.
Organizers say it’s the first and only Soviet theme park inthe
world. Officially, the 30-hectare complex is called the Soviet Sculpture
Garden at Grutas Park. But residents of the nearby village of Grutas have
dubbed it Stalin World—a name that’s stuck.
During a recent gala opening, thousands of invited guests
weregreeted at the gate by an actor dressed as Stalin; a Lenin look-a-like,
completewith a goatee and cap, sat fishing by a nearby pond. Guests were
invitedto
drink shots of vodka and eat cold borscht soup from tin bowls, whileloud
speakers blared old communist hymns. Nearby, red Soviet propaganda posters read:
“
There’s No Happier Youth in the World Than Soviet Youth!”
“It combines the charms of a Disneyland with the worst of the
Soviet gulag prison camp,” Malinauskas told assembledjournalists, including a
handful from abroad who’d flown in to report onthe bizarre spectacle.
The park was opened on April 1, April Fool’s Day, but it’s a
dead serious venture. Malinauskas, considered one of the wealthiest men in
Lithuania, launched his Stalin World project after he won a nationwide
competition three years ago for rights to use Soviet-era statues that had been
taken
down from city squares following Lithuanian independence, and then mothballed.
Malinauskas argued that the fun-loving atmosphere around
thepark demonstrated Lithuanians had a healthy view of history and were
finallyputting the tragic Soviet past behind them. He added that he wants to
developthe
site, in which his Hesona mushroom company has invested some 1 million dollars,
into a major tourist attraction.
Stalin World, with an admission price of about 2 dollars, also
has a café, playground and small zoo.

Not everyone is laughing along with Malinauskas and his supporters.
Some have bitterly criticized the park as tacky in the extreme and an affront to
hundreds of thousands of Lithuanians who were deported, shot or repressed in
other ways during 1940-1991 Soviet rule.
Many Lithuanians were particularly incensed by plans to builda
mock railway that would carry visitors in cattle wagons from Vilnius to Stalin
World, a la some Mickey Mouse train ferrying tourists from one Disney
attraction to another. The idea, say park developers, would be to give
youngerLithuanians a hint of what it’d feel like to be deported.
But Leonas Kerosierius, a fierce critic of the park who has
spoken out onbehalf of some 60,000 survivors of Stalinist deportations still
alive
inLithuania, said the facility makes light of some of the worst atrocitiesof
the 20th century.
“Imagine that in your country, one day armed KGB men come
toyour door. They beat your neighbor, rape your sister, your mother, kill
yourbrothers...and exile your family,” Kerosierius was quoted by The National
Post
newspaper. “And now someone is buildingmonuments to these killers, these
rapists?
No country has ever built monumentsfor tyrants. Are there any monuments for
Hitler or Goebbels?”
But Malinauskas, who said his own fatherand several other
relatives were also deported, has been undeterred by thecriticism. He’s even
been
quoted as welcoming it, saying it’s drawn evenmore publicity to the grounds
and
is contributing to its future success.
He said he hopes to attract at leasta million visitors a year
to the park, which would make it one of the mostvisited tourist sights in the
country.
—<A
HREF="http://www.balticsworldwide.com">CITY PAPER-The Baltic</A>


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